The number of job vacancies in the Israeli economy continued to rise in December 2025, reaching the highest number since November 2022, the Central Bureau of Statistics reports. The rate of unfilled jobs reached 4.59% of all jobs in the economy - the highest rate since October 2022.
The total number of job vacancies in Israel rose to 152,134 in December, compared with 150,953 in November. According to data, the heaviest shortage of employees is among sales workers. There is a shortage of nearly 14,000 such workers, almost 10% of all job vacancies in the country. Furthermore, the shortage is only getting worse for business owners: in the current monthly update, the demand for salespeople and sales agents increased by about 1,000 jobs.
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To mark the end of 2025, the Central Bureau of Statistics reported the job vacancy rate by industry. That is, the ratio between vacant positions and all filled positions. At the top of the list is the construction industry, with a ratio of 8.8%. Although this is better than the more dire situation recorded in the average of 2024, which was 10.2%, it has still not fallen to the 6.8% recorded before the war when Palestinian workers were still available to building contractors.
Another significant industry with a high demand for workers is the hospitality and food sector, with an 8.9% ratio between vacant jobs and workers, the same as the average for 2024. What these two industries have in common is a relatively low level of required skill, including the level of education. This supports the report by the Israel Employment Service published today, which shows that for academic professions, which require high skills, there is currently a surplus of workers in relation to the number of jobs. On the other hand, in low- and medium-skilled professions, primarily in the manufacturing and construction sectors, there is a severe shortage of workers.
Despite the "juniors crisis" and the concern that AI will take over a significant portion of tech work, the tech services sector still has 4.8% vacancies. This is an increase from the 4.2% average in 2024, and even from the 4.5% average recorded in the months before the war in 2023. The trade sector also has an increase of 4.9% to 4.4% compared with 2024. The sector with the lowest job vacancy rate is the health sector, with only 2.1% vacancies.
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on January 18, 2026.
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